


you planted roots (down by the sea)

by blackkat



Series: in dreams you follow (but I dream in the dark) [5]
Category: Naruto
Genre: Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Angst, F/F, F/M, Family, Friendship, Gen, Humor, Hurt/Comfort, M/M, akatsuki kiba
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2018-01-04
Updated: 2018-12-09
Packaged: 2019-02-28 11:03:02
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 7
Words: 9,866
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/13270089
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/blackkat/pseuds/blackkat
Summary: Moments in time, including fractures, faultlines, and things fixed. Bits and pieces from between stories in the Akatsuki!Kiba 'verse.





	1. Chapter 1

_Windflower_ , Genma thinks, smoothing the tattered note between his fingertips. He knows the meaning of it, because it’s the same code his family has been using since before the Warring Clans era.

_Windflower. Dangerous but survivable. No immediate peril._

Letting out a slow, careful breath, he drops into one of the chairs at his kitchen table, then shapes a seal with one hand. With a shimmer of pale chakra, the seals come to life, stretching out across the property and settling into the earth. Shikamaru is just leaving, passing the gate with steps that are maybe a little quicker than normal, but his is the only other chakra signature Genma can sense.

Relieved, Genma sets the note aside and sorts through the scrolls, arranging them by the knots in the cords tying them. The one he opened was the first, but he doesn’t reach for it again. Slumps back in his chair, instead, and closes his eyes, raking a hand through his hair.

He doesn’t even have to read the scrolls to know that this is already far, far more information than they would ever have gotten with Jiraiya’s methods. Far more than any other person could have possibly given them. Barely half a year and Kiba's already proven his worth, that sacrificing Danzō and a naïve genin boy wasn’t in vain. Whatever information this is, Kiba already succeeded at his mission.

Maybe, in a kinder world, this would be enough. They would retrieve Kiba, let him come back home and settle back into the village, a little older, a little wiser, his mission complete. Maybe they never would have sent him in the first place, but picked someone else _, anyone_ else, even if not having ties to Naruto made their chance of being recruited a hell of a lot slimmer.

There's no other world, though. No other way for them to get the advantage. Kiba has to stay in Akatsuki, keep risking his life every second he’s out of the village, so that they know enough to ward off the threat.

It’s not as though children as soldiers is anything new. When Genma was Kiba's age, he was a chuunin on the battlefield, facing down Suna nin and trying not to die. There's a difference, of course—Genma never had to lie to his family, his friends. Never had to go undercover when the stakes were quite that high. Bad enough what happened, even knowing he was headed for all-out war; Kiba's mission is something a lot more insidious, more damaging.

When he comes home—if he comes home—nothing will ever be the same again.

There's a flicker of guilt, caught in the depth of Genma's chest, that’s entirely for his part in all of this. He trained Kiba, he agreed to this, and even if the Hokage ordered it he always had the option to refuse. To disobey.

He’d thought about volunteering in Kiba's place, after that first day of training. Thought what he could possibly do to make Akatsuki recruit him. But there was nothing, because he only has tenuous ties to Naruto forged through Minato, and Naruto doesn’t even know about them. As much as that has always stuck in Genma's craw, he can't change it. It’s too late. Tsunade would probably waive the punishment for treason in a way the Sandaime never would have, but Naruto's found his own family now. Genma can't intrude.

He’s come to terms with it, but it still means the likelihood of Akatsuki taking him on was about equal with those of every other missing-nin in the world. And those odds just _weren’t good enough_.

So he did his part. He kept his mouth shut, shared clan secrets in a way no Shiranui has ever done before, and then sent Kiba off to kill a veteran shinobi while he paced his garden and waited for Tsunade to call him.

And now—

And now.

He smiles, crooked but proud, and flips the first scroll open. Chemicals and equations and recipes for death, laid out in neat lines over the thin paper. Genma scans them even as he pulls open the third scroll, lays it out right on top of the first one. As soon as the edges are aligned, the blur of the covered words comes clear, numbers and characters showing between the lines on the top paper. They join with the others, an entirely new message, and Genma huffs a pleased sound, running his fingertip down one of the neat columns.

This, he thinks, a little bemused, is probably what his mother used to feel, when she was teaching him the code. It’s so entirely theirs, and—

Well. It’s still theirs. _Ours_ just happens to include one more person now. Kiba's an honorary Shiranui, and Genma knows that even his dragon of a grandmother wouldn’t argue for a second. He knows their skills, their codes, their ways. He’s risking his life for the village, on one of the most dangerous missions possible, and Genma's one of the reasons he’s there. The absolute _least_ he can do is mark Kiba's name down in the family records. That way, even if Kiba never gets back all the things he lost in taking on this mission, he can have _something_ to call his own.

Taking another breath, Genma picks up a pen and a fresh scroll and starts translating. Kiba's trying to save all of them, and Genma might not be able to do much, but he’ll still try everything he can.


	2. Chapter 2

More often than not, Fū thinks this is all some fever-dream.

It seems impossible that Danzō would be dead. Impossible that Danzō even _could_ die when he always seemed so much stronger than any man could be. Larger than life, as menacing as a monster right out of Fū’s deepest nightmares. Torune never seemed to notice, but—

Torune was different, a little. He was strange before Danzō took him, out of place. Being held apart from the village was nothing new for him.

It was for Fū, though. He was a Yamanaka before Danzō, used to a large clan and a loud family and people everywhere, always. Used to being a prodigy, with Inoichi himself as a mentor. Being taken away from that, even as Inoichi protested fiercely, was a shock. He hadn’t even been able to comprehend the differences until he was drowning in them.

Now it feels a little like he’s drowning all over again, but this time the water is warm instead of icily foreboding. He’s surrounded by a family that had thought him dead, the family he’d thought lost to him, Danzō’s conditioning slowly cracking under the care of the Yamanaka Clan’s best mind-healers. It’s so unlike what he thought the rest of his life would be that he still wakes every morning expecting to see sterile bunks, plain walls, his mask hanging from the hook beside his bed.

He doesn’t. He sees Inoichi instead, leaning in to call him down for breakfast. Sees Ino, bright and bold and kind, careful of upsetting him even though he knows she never will, with a strange undercurrent of hero worship for him that he can't understand. She isn’t _scared_ , the way some people are. Doesn’t hesitate to drag him into sparring or hang all over him or try to wheedle him into teaching her the tricks he’s developed.

Fū hadn’t really thought he would be able to love anyone, after his training. Had been horribly certain that the vague fondness he felt for Torune was all he _could_ feel. But now, with the memories of the training starting to fade, with help and warmth and people who care, Fū can feel it. He loves Torune, his best friend through hell and out the other side. He loves Inoichi, endlessly giving, who pulled Fū into his own house and gave him a bed and a room and a _place._ And he loves Ino, who is everything a Yamanaka should be, beautiful and smart and strong and so eager to grow into herself.

More than anyone else, she treats him like a person, and he would adore her for that alone even if he didn’t have so many other reasons.

Ino is the future Clan Head, and Fū knows that means she’s strong in her own right. She’s still twelve, though, not even thirteen yet and still a genin, and…maybe he’s a little more paranoid than the situation calls for, but Fū can feel something dark and furious curl in his stomach at the thought of what someone might do with a kunoichi as promising as Ino. Danzō did it with him, after all. And likely it’s needless concern, but Fū keeps thinking of what might happen if someone tries to take after Danzō.

He isn’t willing to risk Ino on the off chance that it might not happen.

Thankfully, Ino is a clever girl. She rolls her eyes the first few times he tags along with her when she goes out, or when he asks Inoichi to give them the same shifts in the flower shop. After that she never comments on it, though, and she seems entirely fine with his presence, even when she’s meeting her team.

(Torune had _looked_ at him when he caught Fū sitting in a tree with perfect line of sight to the clearing where Ino was training, sharpening his tantō. Looked at him and shaken his head and said nothing very, very loudly.

Sometimes, Fū tries to convince himself that he thinks longingly of the days when Torune had no personality to speak of.)

It’s a day for D-ranks, today, which is usually at least mildly amusing even to someone with a sense of humor best labeled _stunted_. The Nara boy is complaining about having to do double the work, though he hasn’t stopped weeding since Ino threatened him last time he started slacking off. The Akimichi is more good-tempered about having to care for one of the public gardens, cheerfully moving where Ino directs, while their sensei sprawls on a bench to smoke and smirk at them.

Fū can't quite recall his genin team. Some of his older memories are foggy like that. Watching Ino and her friends, though, he wishes that he could. They must be good memories.

“You're Ino's new role model, I hope you know.”

Blinking, Fū glances down at the jounin—Sarutobi Asuma, wind natured, previously one of the Twelve Guardian Ninja with a preference for bladed weaponry, he thinks without quite meaning to, and wants to grimace at himself—and then looks back at Ino as she transplants a seedling.

“Inoichi said the same thing,” he offers after a moment of struggling to find a response.

Dark eyes linger on him for a long moment, and then Asuma smiles faintly. “It’s a good thing,” he says, glancing away before Fū can disagree. “Between you and Anko, she’s progressing twice as fast as she did before.”

Ino has a strong will. It’s one of the things Fū admires about her. He lets himself smile just a little—because he _can_ , because no one _cares_ —and shifts back, settling more easily on the low branch of the oak he’s staked out. “She’s strong.”

Asuma hums in agreement, though something grim and tired flickers over his face. “She’s going to have to be. Akatsuki’s getting more active.”

Torune’s adopted brother was on the team that last encountered them, Fū knows. It had left Torune the closest Fū has ever seen to shaken when Shino came back with bandaged wounds and a persistent, pervasive silence that couldn’t be broken for a solid week. And, with how Ino is progressing and her particular abilities as both a sensor and a fighter with good range, it’s likely that she’ll end up on a team with Uzumaki Naruto at some point. If Akatsuki comes after the jinchuuriki again—

Well. Fū would really prefer that they didn’t.

“The traitor won't know what I’ve been teaching her,” he says, more to reassure himself than Asuma. “It will be an edge for her.”

Asuma makes a sound that’s something like affirmation, though traced through with grim anger. “Killing village elders and stealing clan secrets,” he says, and it’s not quite a scoff but it’s certainly unhappy. “The Inuzuka kid needs to be brought in. Murdering the people in your own village should never been an answer, regardless of the circumstances.”

Something cold as ice and hard as stone slides through Fū’s chest, and he looks down at his hand. It’s gone white-knuckled around the hilt of his tantō, and it’s a tell Danzō never would have allowed. But Danzō is dead, and even if Inuzuka Kiba is a traitor, Fū thinks of waking like each day is a warm haze of a dream, perfect and peaceful and something he’d thought entirely out of reach.

“I'm glad,” he manages to get out, through the sudden tightness in his throat. “I'm glad he’s dead. That a traitor killed him.”

There's a sharply indrawn breath beside him, but Fū doesn’t wait to find out whether it’s apologetic or accusatory. He drops from his perch and moves to where Ino is heaving up a larger potted tree, catching the other side and helping her lift it. Ino makes a sound of surprise, leaning around the leaves to look at him, and then her face breaks into a smile.

“Thanks, Fū,” she says cheerfully, guiding him back towards the hole the Akimichi boy dug.

No hesitation, no wariness. Fū is absolutely sure she knows what he did, what he was; Inoichi had the files, and Ino is curious and clever about satisfying that curiosity. She’s said a few things that hint at it, at least to him. But she’s never feared him, not once.

He smiles back, and it’s still a little strange, a bit foreign on his face, but trying is worth it just for the way her expression brightens. This, he thinks, is likely how Torune feels when he’s with Shino.

“Of course,” he answers as they set the tree down. He glances around the small garden, then asks, “Would it be all right if I helped?”

“Sure! You can make up for Shika, since he moves like a concussed snail.” Ino grins brightly, grabs his wrist, and tugs him down. Obediently, Fū settles on the ground, letting her duck around behind him. A moment later, there are gentle fingers in his hair. “Your hair’s going to get all in your face without your hitai-ate, though,” she informs him. “I’ll braid it for you.”

Fū closes his eyes, focusing on the light touch of her fingers. He isn’t tense; Ino is family, not a threat, and Danzō is likely turning in his grave but Fū doesn’t give a damn. The man is dead, and Fū has his happiness back.

Inuzuka Kiba might be a traitor and a threat to the village, but for that, Fū thinks he’s a bit of a hero, too.


	3. Chapter 3

The first thing Konan sees is a blur of wild brown hair, white teeth bared, fingers curled into claws. A confusing whirl of battered clothes and limbs, interspersed with Deidara’s angry screeching and flailing. There's a flash of a blade, a smear of pale explosive clay, a snarl that sounds like something a wild animal would make more than anything from a human throat.

“Hey, hey!” Kisame says, laughing. Big hands snatch up the fighting pair, pulling them apart like they're rambunctious children—

Because they are. Konan goes still in the library’s doorway, fingers closing hard around the edge of the frame. Deidara is sixteen and childish, but the other boy—

She’d told Nagato to recruit Konoha's runaway genin, wanted for murdering Danzō, his past rife with whispers about why a young boy would be in the home of an old man late at night and terrified enough to kill him. But somehow, in all of Sasori’s reports, she hadn’t quite made the connection.

He’s as young as they were when Jiraiya took them on, or maybe younger. Skinny and scrawny and not yet filled out, with baby fat in his cheeks even as he growls at Deidara. Genin, she thinks, and it feels a little like stepping into ice water. _Child_. He must be twelve at the _most_.

Maybe it’s the shape of his face, or the marks on his cheeks, or the hair falling around his face, but Konan takes one look at him and thinks of the dog they had as children. Thinks of _being_ a child, before the war started, and then tries to transpose it onto a boy raised to be a shinobi. The Inuzuka are a well-known clan, and he’s the son of the Clan Head. It’s likely always been in his blood, but…it doesn’t show in his skin.

Konan might feel more at ease if it did.

But.

But he killed Danzō. Sasori was very specific about that. Killed the old man with poison and left him in the front hallway of his house, then escaped and vanished into the night. The very next day he’d been a missing-nin, and Konan feels the same sense of vicious satisfaction, thinking of it now, that she did when Hanzō died. Two of the architects of their destruction, gone forever. It’s as sweet as summer wine, and just as intoxicating. She now lives in a world where neither of them exist. One step closer to paradise.

“Nagato got us a puppy,” she says, keeps it even and cool as she steps forward. She keeps her eyes on Kiba's face, watching the way he doesn’t jump, the certain way he looks over, like he already knows precisely where she is.

Kisame's grin shows enough pointed teeth to make most people recoil. Kiba just hangs in his grip and glares sullenly, arms crossed over his chest. He couldn’t announce how unimpressed he is more clearly if he actually waved a sign, and Konan has to hide a faint smile. If she couldn’t see the flicker of his pulse in his throat, quite a bit faster than normal, she would probably buy that look.

“That’s what Deidara was saying  when he got jumped,” Kisame informs her cheerfully. “Careful there.”

Konan raises one brow, because Kisame sparred with her just yesterday. He should remember very clearly just how little she needs to worry about _anyone_.

Kisame's expression shifts to sheepish, and he huffs, dropping Deidara—still yelling—on his feet.

“Bastard!” Deidara spits, kicks Kisame hard in the ankle, and spins to level a threatening finger at their new recruit. “Next time I'm going to shove explosive clay up your nose, un! Fuck off!”

Kiba growls, teeth bared in what’s definitely not a smile. “Try it,” he snaps, and Kisame shakes him lightly.

“Easy, easy,” the swordsman tells them, though that grin says he’s waiting for more violence. “If you blow up the base Pein’ll make you clean it up by hand.”

Deidara spits a curse at the room in general, spins on his heel, and stalks out. Only after he’s gone does Kisame set his other captive on the ground, and as soon as Kiba's feet are touching stone he wrenches away, jerking his tattered jacket down onto his shoulders again.

“Grab me again and I’ll have a neurotoxin with your name on it,” he snaps.

“Not,” Konan says quietly, “in the base.”

To her faint surprise, Kiba pauses. He flicks a look at her, then at Kisame, and subsides with a huff, stalking over to an abandoned bag. “Where’s my room,” he growls, but it’s less hostile than before. He doesn’t make eye contact, either, just glares at his sandals, and—

He’s young. _So_ young. All bravado and anger, like Yahiko when he was threatened. And in this situation, of course they _are_ threatening, regardless of being nominal allies. Nagato doesn’t exactly manage to look nonthreatening these days, regardless of his actions, and Kiba was just snatched from the borders of Fire Country and dragged all the way here with only vague promises of employment.

It’s no wonder he’s bristling.

“This way,” Konan says, even though it’s Kisame's job to get him settled. The big man doesn’t protest, just watches with amusement as Konan heads in the opposite direction from Deidara with Kiba following a few cautious yards behind her.

He’ll get bolder, Konan thinks. He must have been at least a little bold already, to have slaughtered Danzō, and she has faith that he’ll regain that quickly in their company.

She wonders how Danzō died.

(Catches a glimpse in a mirror, as they pass, of Kiba's face, wide-eyed and pale and _childlike_ , and hopes with all her heart that it was slowly.)


	4. Chapter 4

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> A warning for Deidara and Kiba's mouths here. Beware the excessive cursing.

“I can't fucking believe they want _us_ to play messenger,” Kiba grouses, batting a spray of leave out of his face.

“I _know_ , un,” Deidara huffs, slumping forward to rest his chin on his crossed arms as he glares at the four Iwa patrols scattered around the main street of the village. “Fucking Iwa,” he mutters unhappily.

Kiba hasn’t exactly had a lot of experience with Iwa outside his mom’s war stories, but he’s feeling inclined to agree. Sasori is at the inn squarely in the middle of the town, waiting for them to collect information he’s found on the Gobi and the Yonbi, but there are probably twenty Iwa nin between them and Sasori, and of _course_ the bastard won't deign to drag his ass out to meet them. Not when Pein told them all, several times and very specifically, that there was to be no killing at all on this mission. Apparently a lot of Iwa nin get jumpy this close to the Ame border, and Pein draws the line at sparking another invasion.

“Why _us_ ,” Kiba complains.

Deidara just looks sour. “Because I'm from Iwa, so I'm the only one who can find this piece of shit town, un. And you're the fucking mascot or something.” A pause, and he huffs. “And ‘cause you look like the brat you are, so no one cares where you go. I bet you could wander into a women’s bathhouse and you’d just get _cooed_ at, un.”

“Fuck you,” Kiba snaps. “I wouldn’t do that, I'm not _gross_. If you want to try it, I hope someone beats the crap out of you.”

“Do I look like a pervert to you?” Deidara retorts scathingly. “It was an _example_ , un.” He pauses, glaring down at the Iwa shinobi, and then deflates slightly. “Fucking _wonderful_. They probably all know what I look like.”

Right. Because Deidara only left Iwa a year or two ago at most. He probably _knows_ the shinobi down there. Kiba rubs his nose and tries not to groan too loudly. Pein _really_ had it out for them when he gave them this mission.

After a moment to consider, he judges the number of civilians also on the street, but it’s pretty low. Still, better than nothing. “I could go?” he offers. “Nobody’s going to care about one kid wandering around, right?”

Deidara hesitates, scanning the street as well. He looks vaguely doubtful. “Maybe. Or maybe the villagers will notice immediately and say something, un. It’s a big fucking risk.”

And they're only going to get one shot at this. Kiba grimaces, but slides back out from under the bush and then eels around the edge of the rock it’s abutting. At least he’s got a better chance at going unnoticed than Deidara, so they might as well _try_.

A second later Deidara crawls out from beneath the bush as well, looking cross. “Konan's going to fucking _murder_ me,” he mutters, tugging Kiba's hitai-ate off his head and roughly scuffing his hair into even more of a mess. When Kiba hisses in protest, Deidara just shoves his head down, grabbing for a sealing scroll in his pack. “Shut up, don’t even _try_ , un. You reek of Fire Country, and pretty much everyone down there fought in the last war.”

This idea is sounding worse and worse. Fan-fucking-tastic, Kiba thinks, but he strips off the clothes he’s wearing and pulls out the civilian set he’d hoped he wouldn’t need for this mission. He’d still brought it, though; that probably counts as learning from past mistakes.

“Wait, don’t put your shirt on yet,” Deidara snaps, catching his wrist as he reaches for the piece of clothing. Kiba turns, ready to ask him why, and promptly splutters as a makeup brush hits him in the face. He probably should have been expecting it, since henges are a risk if there's anyone who can sense them or see through them, but it’s still unpleasant not to be given any warning.

“Hey!” he protests.

“Keep your damn voice down,” Deidara retorts, getting a hand on top of his head to hold him still as he works. “I'm changing the shape of your face, un. I haven’t seen an updated copy of the Bingo Book yet, but Konoha’ll definitely stick your face at the top of the enemies list.” His eyes narrow in frustration, and he mutters, “Fucking _tattoos_ , you might as well just get _I'm a ninja_ on your forehead with neon paint, un. Close your eyes.”

“Eyeliner?” Kiba asks, because he knows the basics, but Hana never wore a lot of makeup, and his mom didn’t have time to teach him more.

There's a faintly wary pause, like Deidara is waiting for a follow-up, but before Kiba can crack an eye open to check his face he says, “Yeah. Just a little, to draw the eye away from _your_ eyes. Those pupils aren’t something I can cover, un.”

“Would you teach me?” Kiba kind of wants to open his eyes, or squint against the faint tickle, but forces himself to hold still. “Yours is always cool.”

Another long pause, and then Deidara snorts. “Sure, puppy, ‘cause I don’t have anything better to do with my time,” he says, though it’s far less biting than normal. “When we’re somewhere with a mirror, un. You can open your eyes. Almost done.”

Kiba blinks them open, and the sensation takes a second to get used to, but it should be enough of a reminder not to rub his face. “Can I put my shirt on? It’s cold.”

Deidara scoffs. “It’s _August_ , un. This is sweltering for Iwa. At least the whole place isn’t a damned sauna like Fire Country.”

“It is _not_ ,” Kiba retorts. “Just because we’re smart enough to live south of the _Arctic Circle_ doesn’t mean—” He catches the scent of unwashed body on the breeze and snaps his mouth shut, ducking down. Thankfully, Deidara doesn’t hesitate, doing the same, and they go still as multiple footsteps pass a few feet from their hiding place, then continue on towards the town.

“Fuck,” Deidara mutters, sitting up carefully. “That’s a fuck-ton of shinobi, what the hell are they _doing_ here.”

Kiba isn’t any happier with the situation. “Sasori tracked the Gobi here,” he suggests. “Maybe they did too.”

Deidara pauses, but after a moment he nods. “That old bastard Ōnoki would wet himself at the idea of getting Han back. And Han wouldn’t go down for anything less than a small army, un.”

“You knew him?” Kiba asks, surprised.

“He’s a _jinchuuriki_ ,” Deidara tells him witheringly. “I know _about_ him, un. He left Iwa before I was born, but he’s eight feet tall, wears thick armor, and can split a mountain with a kick. _Everyone_ knows about him.”

It’s so hard to think of jinchuuriki as _something that Naruto is_. Kiba keeps getting hung up on things like _can split a mountain with a kick_ or _is stronger than the Raikage_ , and when he tries to fit Naruto into that picture—it just doesn’t _work_.

“Put your shirt on and get down there,” Deidara says, less sharp and more concerned. His eyes keep flickering back towards the town. “We need to get out of Iwa, un.”

Not about to argue, Kiba ties the shirt closed, kicks off his sandals, and tries to put a slouch in his shoulders. “Distraction?” he suggests, because if there's one think Deidara is good at it’s blowing thing up and causing a commotion.

Deidara grimaces. “They’d just split their forces,” he points out. “And then you’d have _alert_ shinobi, un. Better to sneak in.”

“Says the one not doing the sneaking,” Kiba mutters, but he scoops up an armful of small branches that look like passable kindling and slips around to approach the town from a different direction.

“Don’t die or Konan will fucking kill me in the middle of the night!” Deidara hisses after him.

“No she wouldn’t!” Kiba calls back, as loud as he dares. “She’d make sure you saw it coming!”

To the sound of Deidara spluttering, he saunters down the path, flipping a stick into his hand to wave like a sword as the first shinobi come into view. Easy enough to pretend he’s laughing to himself, at his play-acting with a fake sword, instead of his mission partner, and the Iwa nin don’t even bother to give him a second look as he skips past.


	5. Chapter 5

Getting hauled back from Tanzaku Gai with no notice and no chance to do anything but snatch up his things is a little irritating, Jiraiya thinks, clomping up the stairs to the Hokage’s office. Tsunade should _know_ by now that he does his best work when left to his own devices, and he’s got a lead on _something_ Akatsuki related up north. There aren’t a lot of good bars or hot women up north, sadly, but Jiraiya will totally count this as taking one for the team.

With an aggrieved sigh, he raps his knuckles against the closed door three times, wondering if Tsunade is even here. Its well after midnight, and he saw a light on as he approached but maybe that was just something left on, and—

“It’s open.”

Jiraiya almost startles out of his skin at the quiet voice right next to his ear, whipping around to find the cat-masked ANBU who’s always glued to Tsunade's side barely six inches behind him. Maybe his tiredness is getting to him, or age, because Jiraiya never heard so much as a hint of his presence and he doesn’t like that _at all_.

“Damn it, kid,” he complains, willing his heartbeat back down from hummingbird levels. “Where the hell did you come from?”

The masked head tips, and it’s the closest to innocent an ANBU can get. Instead of answering, he slips around Jiraiya and pushes the door open, walking in without hesitation. Grumbling under his breath, Jiraiya follows, just in time to see Tsunade turn away from the wide window overlooking Konoha. She offers him a faint smile, but there's a tired sort of worry in the lines of her face, something deep-set and familiar; Jiraiya used to see her looking like that in the war, and it makes him feel…old. Tired.

They’ve come right around to fighting for their village again, and this time it’s not nearly as simple as open warfare.

“Thank you, Jiraiya,” Tsunade tells him, but almost immediately her gaze slides over to the ANBU as he closes and locks the door. “Anyone?”

Reinforced gloves click against porcelain as the ANBU pulls his mask off, and—it hurts, a little, seeing his face. Because Shiranui was Minato's guard as well, and Jiraiya _knows_ Tsunade is brilliant as Hokage, that this is what she was always meant for, but…

He looks at her, sometimes, and wishes with all his heart that Minato was still in that seat.

“Two chuunin finishing paperwork,” Shiranui tells Tsunade, laying his mask on the corner of her desk. “I sent them home, and made sure they went. We’re alone.” When Tsunade just raises a brow at him, he rolls his eyes a little and shapes a seal with one hand, frowning in concentration.

It’s a little like getting dropped into a pool of warm water, Jiraiya thinks, jolting back a step in surprise. Ripples spreading out, with only the three of them as bright spots of chakra to block the flow. It encompasses the whole building, including the Academy, ending in oddly straight lines instead of the fuzziness that comes at the edges of a sensor’s range.

As the feeling fades, Jiraiya takes a breath, looking Shiranui over with a little more respect. “Seals to mimic sensor abilities?” he says, impressed.

The tokujo nods. “Shiranui Clan technique. It takes a while to set up, and it only covers a small area, but it works.”

“It also means we can be sure we’re alone,” Tsunade cuts in. “Genma laid the seals in secret, so we’re the only ones who know about them.”

Paranoia, and more than normal. Jiraiya frowns a little, looking from his Hokage to her guard, and folds his arms over his chest. “All right, I’ll bite. What’s this about? And why is it so important that you had to drag me back here? I have leads that might go cold if I take too long.”

There's a moment of silence as Tsunade stares at him narrowly, somewhere between patient and threatening. After a second, she smiles thinly and asks, “Are you done, Jiraiya?”

His kneejerk reaction is to protest being treated like a green chuunin who’s feeling too big for his britches. His second is to glare right back, because he doesn’t like being in Konoha any more than Tsunade does; if anyone should understand, it’s her. He keeps his mouth shut, though, waiting, because he’s not _actually_ a child anymore.

“All right,” Tsunade allows after a second. She looks at her guard, then sinks down in her chair and pushes a short stack of papers across the desk. “Forget your old leads. We have new information on Akatsuki’s members and goals. See if you can't pull something useful out of here.”

Information? On _Akatsuki_? And that much of it? Jiraiya has maybe three or four _lines_ of information on them, and all of it is out of date. He gives Tsunade an incredulous look, but that’s definitely not her joking face; she’s deathly serious right now.

A little at a loss, Jiraiya settles in the other chair, picking up the top sheet. It’s a list of locations, bases, frequently traveled routes through the countries—most important first, he thinks, remembering his own espionage classes from the Academy. As long as you know where an enemy is, or where they’re going to be, you can send another spy. If you don’t, you're fucked no matter what else you know.

“The Mountains’ Graveyard?” he reads, one brow rising. “That’s an imposing name. I've never heard of it before.”

“Which would be why I called you here,” Tsunade tells him, just a hint of aggravation in her voice, and Jiraiya offers her a slightly sheepish smile. He probably should have learned not to doubt her back when they were genin. Then again, in his own defense, the boobs have always been incredibly distracting.

Dropping his attention back to the report before Tsunade can read that thought in his face and punch him for it, he grabs for the next sheet. More in-depth reading can wait for later; he needs to know just how much they have on the group before he starts analyzing the report as a whole.

The next three pages are member profiles, and Jiraiya can feel his eyebrows climbing towards his hairline as he takes in each neat summary. This is…detailed. _Ridiculously_ detailed. Not only is it an accounting of the members, it goes into all the little things that someone observing from the outside would be hard-pressed to notice. Sasori of the Red Sand has a habit of leaving his back unguarded. Uchiha Itachi has insomnia, likely caused by all the medication he’s taking. Kakuzu of Taki takes more risks the bigger the bounty he’s chasing. And—

He goes still, staring at the last two names on the list.

 _Konan_.

_Pein (also called Nagato)_

The physical description of his eyes is a match to the Rinnegan, and Konan's description is exactly what Jiraiya remembers, right down to the origami flower in her hair. He curls his fingers around the edges of the page, willing himself not to tear it, and tries to breathe around the lump in his throat.

He’d thought his students were dead, killed by Hanzō years ago. All those rumors of an uprising that was put down with force, the ringleaders destroyed—Jiraiya had heard of that and mourned for the three of them, certain they had been murdered for trying to bring peace. One more moment of failure, one possible Child of Prophecy lost, but—

But that would almost be better than _this_.

“Nagato,” he says quietly. “But the description—it sounds like Yahiko.”

Tsunade is watching him, and there's sympathy in her eyes but a grim slant to her mouth. “That’s what I was thinking,” she agrees. “But the girl is definitely one of the Ame orphans, and there's at least one other. We don’t know enough about how the Rinnegan works to know what happened, but I assume it was traumatic.”

“Isn’t everything,” Jiraiya says wryly, though he can't quite look away from the report. His mind is working, churning through the details. Bases, routes, members, abilities, weaknesses—it’s too much. No one looking from the outside would be able to get this volume of information without being detected.

“You have someone on the inside,” he realizes, jerking his head up to stare at his old teammate. “You _infiltrated Akatsuki_?”

Her mouth curves into an expression that’s halfway between bittersweet and proud. “We did.”

Nothing more, and…Jiraiya tries to remember any high-ranking shinobi who have gone rogue recently, or dropped off the map, either from Konoha or another village. He can't call up any names, though, no one significant enough to warrant recruitment into an organization of S-ran missing-nin. So who the hell is Tsunade's spy?

Tsunade's smile tilts into amusement, and she rises to her feet, turning to stand by the window again. “That report isn’t to leave this office,” she says firmly. “Read it, Jiraiya. Sleep on it. Then we need to start making plans.”

“Tsunade—” Jiraiya starts to protest.

With a quiet hum, Shiranui cuts him off, rapping the back of his reinforced glove lightly on the desk. “The _how_ ,” he says mildly, “is a hell of a lot less important than the _what_ , don’t you think, Jiraiya-sama?”

Jiraiya casts him a narrow look, but—the Shiranui have always been spies and assassins, and in this at least the kid is correct. He can worry about how Tsunade is getting her information later. Right now, he needs to know what his former student it planning, and if there's any way at all to fight someone with the Rinnegan at their disposal.

(He sees, out of the corner of his eye as he keeps his head bent over the paper, how Shiranui touches Tsunade's shoulder lightly. How she turns to give the ANBU a tired smile, with lines of grief around her eyes. It twists like guilt in his stomach, to think that Konan or Yahiko or Nagato is capable of being this great a threat with the things he taught them.

Just for a moment, he remembers Orochimaru’s offhand _we should kill them, to spare them any more suffering_ and wants to laugh at the sick humor of it all. His godson, one possible Child of Prophecy and the son of another, threatened by the first candidate he found, who he trained partly just to spite Orochimaru. The bastard’s probably laughing himself sick right now, wherever he is.)


	6. Chapter 6

When Hana stumbles downstairs in the predawn, still zipping up her flak jacket and trying to remember where she left her tekkō, it’s less surprising than it probably should be to trip over Akamaru at the edge of the kitchen.

Catching herself on the edge of the table, Hana crouches down to pick up the puppy, tucking him under one arm as she turns the lights on. “Again?” she asks him, faintly exasperated.

Akamaru huffs in confirmation, looking faintly irritated.

Hana rolls her eyes. “What a brat,” she agrees, and whistles quietly for the Haimaru brothers. “I swear he found himself a girlfriend. Mom owes me a hundred ryō.”

Akamaru makes his opinion of _that_ known with a low growl.

“No, I don’t know why he isn’t taking you with him,” Hana tells him. “Maybe she’s allergic to dogs?”

An offended yip.

“Yeah, well, he’s twelve, he’s not _supposed_ to have taste.” Hana drops the puppy on a chair and turns to start the coffeemaker, absently stepping over her ninken as they tumble in to tangle her feet. She pets a few ears, avoids treading on a tail through well-practiced instinct as she goes for a mug, and shakes her head at Akamaru's questioning bark. “Well, I don’t know that for _sure_ , but he’s definitely acting like I did with my first girlfriend. Have you asked him? It’s been a week already, hasn’t it?”

Ear drooping, Akamaru huffs and drops his head onto his paws.

“What is it with boys and sulking?” Hana asks the eldest Haimaru brother, who chortles in amusement and doesn’t answer.

“Biological imperative,” her mother says from the doorway. She wanders over to check the coffee, then leans back against the counter, folding her arms across her chest. “Kiba's out again?”

Akamaru growls, and Hana snorts. “Girlfriend,” she says again. “It’s not Shibi’s son, I checked. No Kiba smell anywhere on the clan lands that’s fresher than a week and a half.”

“I don’t buy it,” Tsume retorts. “Boyfriend. That brat would let a girl walk all over him, but he wouldn’t _enjoy_ it.”

“Because preteen boys are known for good emotionally solid choices,” Hana counters, and laughs when Tsume rolls her eyes. “We should corner him and get an answer.”

Tsume opens her mouth the answer, but before she can get a word out, someone bangs on the door. All three of the Haimaru brothers twist to look, ears pricking up, and Tsume sighs and pushes upright. “I can't _wait_ until you're Clan Head,” she tells Hana.

“You have to die first,” Hana answers sweetly, which is what she always says to that particular statement, seeing as Tsume has been making it for as long as Hana can remember. Still, she waves mother back, stepping past her with her ninken on her heels, and trots down the hall to pull the door open.

It’s not one of the clan members, as she would have expected this early. There's no gate guard in evidence, either, which means whoever is on shift just waved the visitor through, and that’s usually reserved for serious matters. Hana blinks at the sight of Izumo, pale and shaky in a way she hasn’t seen since his first assassination mission, and tilts her head.

“Kamizuki?” she asks curiously. “You look like someone died.”

If anything, Izumo goes paler. He rocks onto his heels like he’s about to take a step back, visibly steels himself, and then says, “The Hokage requested your presence in her office.”

“Mine?” Hana repeats, entirely bewildered and starting to worry more than a little. Izumo sounds like the world is ending, and Konoha is only recently come from a Suna invasion. What could possibly be going wrong now?

“Yours and Lady Tsume’s,” Izumo allows with a faint wince. “It’s urgent.”

It must be, if Tsunade sent him out at this hour of the morning. Not about to question the Hokage's orders, Hana nods, ducks back into the house, and grabs her sandals. “Mom, Hokage wants us!” she calls back down the hall.

Tsume sticks her head around the doorway, brows lifting, but doesn’t hesitate to join Hana, pulling her own sandals on. Akamaru is under one arm, still looking grouch, but Tsume doesn’t seem inclined to put him down, even as she grabs her flak jacket off its hook and tugs it on.

“The Hokage?” she asks, directed at Izumo more than Hana. “She’s working early.”

Izumo swallows hard, and he smells like…not quite fear, Hana thinks, cocking her head. Something sharp and nervous, with an edge of exhaustion behind it. It’s not that Izumo is up early—better to say he hasn’t gone to bed yet.

“There—there was an incident last night,” he says, and looks at Hana helplessly, though she can't even begin to catch what he’s trying to tell her. “Tsunade-sama is going to assemble the rest of the upper ranks in a few hours, but she wanted to speak with you first.”

It must have been a hell of an incident, Hana thinks grimly, trading glances with her mother. Assembling the jounin to deliver news personally—that’s not good. It’s hard to think why Tsunade wants to see _them_ , though. If the Inuzuka clan had been involved, surely they would have noticed.

“Shunshin?” Tsume asks, holding out a hand, and Hana obligingly pulls her to her feet. Looking a little relieved that they're not asking any more questions, Izumo nods, then turns and launches himself into a shunshin without pause. Hana whistles to her pack, feels them jump as she leaps, and stretches her chakra enough to carry all four of them through the blurring speed.

The Administration Building is the very furthest thing from the sleepy building it normally is before dawn, with practically all of the night staff and most of the morning staff mixed together in the halls. Izumo has to thread though small knots of people as he leads them towards the stairs, and Hana glances around, breathing in the smell of fear and uncertainty and trying not to wrinkle her nose. Everyone here is afraid to some degree, unhappy, unsettled. It’s a little overwhelming, and she doesn’t like it.

“Easy,” Tsume says lightly, bumping her shoulder. “We’ll get this over and be back in time to rough up the brat until he tells us who he’s seeing.”

Hana smiles at that, because Kiba will be utterly offended but it won't take long to goad him into talking. He’s a pushover to his friends and family, and he’s still small enough that it’s cute. “Are you that eager to give me your money?” she teases, and her mother scoffs pointedly.

“Age and guile, brat,” Tsume tells her, reaching out to rub her knuckles against the top of Hana's head as they head up the stairs. “With that on my side, _you're_ going to be paying _me_.”

Ahead of them, Izumo raps briefly at the door, then sticks his head in. “Hokage-sama, I have them.”

“Bring them in.”

Hana tips her head, one of the Haimaru brothers’ habits she’s never quite been able to break now that she’s picked it up. Tsunade sounds _tired_ , exhausted in a way that’s more than physical. It’s…worrying. She’s is the strongest kunoichi in Konoha, likely the strongest in the world. Anything that can make her sound like that isn’t something Hana wants to meet.

Tsunade doesn’t smile as Izumo leads them into the office, just rises to her feet. The way she looks matches her tone, and Hana's gaze slips from the tight line of her mouth to the way her assistant is slumped in a chair near the wall, asleep and not so much as twitching.

“Hokage-sama,” Tsume says, eyes narrowed as she gives Tsunade a once-over. “You look like hell.”

Some vague flicker of humor passes through Tsunade's eyes at that, though it dies quickly. “I feel like it,” she says grimly. “Shimura Danzō was murdered last night.”

Hana can hear the sharp hiss of her mother’s indrawn breath, see her shoulders tightening in shock. It arcs through her as well, cold and sharp, and she lifts her head, because Danzō was old but he was _strong_ , and he was one of the pillars of Konoha as well. Whoever managed to take him out must have been strong as well, and fast to boot.

“Do you want us to track him?” she asks, mind already racing ahead. That must be why Tsunade called them—her mother is the best, and Hana might only be eighteen, but she’s nearly as good, and the Haimaru brothers are—

“No,” Tsunade says quietly, meeting Tsume’s narrow gaze. “We already know who killed him. But I wanted to tell you in person before you heard it from one of the squads.”

What? Hana blinks at her, baffled, hears one of her ninken whine as he presses up against her leg. “Tell…us?” she echoes, glancing over, but Tsume isn’t looking at her. She’s still staring at the Hokage, lips pulled back faintly from pointed teeth, one hand curled around Akamaru where he’s tucked into her flak jacket.

“No,” Tsume says flatly, but there's a dangerous bite to it. “ _No_.”

Tsunade grimaces. “Tsume—” she starts.

Tsume _snarls_ , loud and violent enough to make even Hana jump. She takes a quick step back, out of the way, but there's a numb sort of buzzing that’s creeping up her spine, something like horror even as she puts the pieces together. The picture is _wrong_. There's no possible way it can be what she thinks it is. There just _isn’t_.

“No!” Tsume growls. “Whatever you're going to say, you're _wrong_.”

The line of Tsunade's spine pulls straight, and she meets Tsume’s anger head on and without wavering. “There’s proof,” she says. “He was the only one at Danzō’s house last night, and the time of death means it happened before anyone saw him leaving. We found a knife with his blood on it, and another patrol encountered him as he was crossing the wall.”

This is wrong. It has to be. Hana curls her hands into fists, feeling her nails cut into her palms, and forces herself to swallow, to breathe. “He couldn’t have,” she says, and her voice shakes but the realization is something distant, detached. “He—Kiba has never killed anyone before. He _couldn’t_ have.”

It feels like a betrayal, somehow, to say her brother’s name in this context, to even passingly relate him to the murder of a village elder. She lifts her head, meets Tsunade's sympathetic stare, and bares her teeth in answer.

“Apparently he decided to start big,” Tsunade says, but there isn’t an ounce of doubt in her voice. She believes it, believes this—this _bullshit_ about Kiba being at Danzō’s house, killing him, _leaving the village_. Kiba wouldn’t. Hana knows her brother. He’s _kind_ , even when he tries not to be. Gods, he’s even kind to the Uzumaki kid, and that’s with all of his instincts going haywire in the presence of a bigger predator. Even Hana can't take more than a few minutes of Uzumaki before her skin starts to prickle, but Kiba is his _friend_.

“He was gone last night, wasn’t he?” Tsunade asks, unwavering, and she looks from Tsume to Hana and back again. “And he must have been disappearing before that. Several other patrols mentioned seeing him in the area on previous days.”

Tsume growls. “No,” she says again, hands like claws, face full of fury. “I don’t care what the hell you think you know, Kiba isn’t the one who did this.” Spinning on her heel, she stalks out of the room, slamming the door hard behind her.

The reverberation of that bang seems to echo in Hana's bones, jars her loose from her frozen horror and makes her stagger a step. She’s numb all over, knees about to give way, and with a sound that’s almost pain she staggers a step, grips the arm of a chair, and sinks down into it. Her head is spinning, and she presses her palms against her temples, wanting to rage, to shout, to deny everything, but—

But Kiba was gone last night, and he’s been disappearing for at least a week now. Maybe more, if he spaced it out beforehand. He always comes home at night, even if it’s late, but last night he didn’t.

Last night a man was murdered, and the Hokage is absolutely convinced that Kiba did it.

“He wouldn’t,” she says again, more plea than anything.

A hand touches her shoulder, light but comforting, and Tsunade lets Hana lean into her just a little. “I'm sorry,” she says, and there's such aching sympathy in her voice that it hurts worse than a slap. _This is the truth and I'm sorry that it’s like this_ , that voice says. _I'm sorry you’ll have to face this reality_ , it means. And Hana—

She _can't_.

Easy to think of Kiba, the last night they all laughed together. He’d come home full of energy and dragged them into a board game. They’d teamed up to stop Tsume from cheating, and she kept trying more and more blatant tactics until they were all wrestling in the main room, laughing until their sides hurt.

Closing her eyes, Hana tries to think of that boy, blunt and bold but sweet as well, killing a man and fleeing Konoha. Wonders what the odds could possibly be that it’s true.

Wonders what the odds could be that it isn’t, with Tsunade so sure.

Tsunade doesn’t push, just stands there, one hand on Hana's shoulder and grief written into the lines of her face. She doesn’t say anything, and somehow, that feels heavier than any words ever could.

Hana buries her face in her hands and tries not to fall apart.


	7. Chapter 7

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This is a POSSIBLE FUTURE, inspired by an ask i got on Tumblr: Shino is going to drag Kiba back? I can totally see Kiba allowing that when it’s time to come home, and just allowing him to have that satisfaction. Right up until the whole thing is revealed.

Lack of chakra is the first thing that registers, a slippery, lightheaded sort of vertigo that Kiba’s become all too familiar with. Practice faking sleep keeps every muscle lax, his breathing sleep-deep and steady, but he takes stock before he’s even fully conscious. Wrists bound, chakra almost nonexistent, no weapons that he can feel except the explosive charm Deidara gave him in his ear. His ankles are bound as well, but even though the bonds are ninja wire they aren’t tight enough to do damage.

Definitely one of the nicer ways Kiba’s woken up after being captured, all told.

He takes a careful breath, because lack of chakra doesn’t affect his sense of smell, and—that’s familiar.  _Desperately_  familiar, in a way Kiba doesn’t usually allow himself to think about. Subtly, carefully, he tries to wriggle his fingers and check if the wires have give to them.

Somehow, it’s less than surprising to find that he can’t move them at all.

“You’re paralyzed,” an unimpressed voice informs him. “Or mostly so. Why, you ask? Because I have been preparing for our encounter since the last time you escaped from me.”

For a long moment, Kiba can’t even make himself breathe. He lies where Shino must have left him, sprawled on his side on a particularly lush patch of grass, with Shino’s warm leaf-scent in his nose, and it’s all he can do to just close his eyes, smiling helplessly.

“Shino,” he says, and it comes out rough and warm. There’s no flicker of panic in his chest, no surge of horror at his friends accidentally putting all of his work at risk. Just—peace, maybe, though it’s been almost six years since Kiba really felt it last.

Akatsuki is disbanded, though, its members scattered or dead. There are plans for the survivors to gather in Konoha when enough time has passed for Kiba to get them welcomes from Tsunade. He’d planned to, had already been working on a way to get into the village unnoticed, but—

He hadn’t thought of this. Hadn’t thought of letting his old teammate drag him home like a prize side of venison. After everything he’s put Shino through, though, if anyone has a right to Kiba’s capture it’s him.

Kiba curls forward as much as he can with his arms bound and unresponsive behind him, buries his face in the soft new grass and takes a shaky breath. There’s tension he hadn’t even realized he was carrying sliding out of him, washing away under a tide of sheer relief, fierce and desperate joy that everything is  _over_.

“Kiba?” Shino asks quietly. There’s a few light steps before sandals enter his field of vision, and Shino crouches down in front of him, expression cautious but also faintly worried. He looks like he did when they were kids, but then, Kiba can see the changes in him, too. they’ve all changed, over the years.

He manages a smile, one he really means, turns his head enough that Shino can see it too. “Suits you,” he says roughly. “The bandana. Never got a chance to tell you before.”

Shino pauses like he’s waiting for the trap to spring, bracing himself for whatever bit of venom Kiba is going to throw at him next. For the first time in six years, though, Kiba doesn’t  _have_  to, and the relief of it is dizzying.

When Kiba doesn’t add anything, just keeps looking at his best friend the way he hasn’t allowed himself in years, Shino reaches up, carefully runs a hand over his hitai-ate where it’s tied over his hair. “The hair used to add to my height,” he admits. “I don’t need it anymore.”

“You sure don’t,” Kiba says, and laughs a little, closing his eyes again. He wants to keep lying here for a little while longer, warm with sunlight and joy in equal measure, but he also wants to go  _home_. Back to Konoha, the way he always promised himself he would.

A calloused hand brushes across the scar bisecting his clan marking, lingering for a moment. “Are you all right?” Shino asks, and there’s a thread of concern in it that Kiba doesn’t deserve at all. “The toxin is largely untested. Why, you ask? Because it’s a new species I created specifically to stop you.”

Kiba snorts, shifting enough to roll back onto one arm so he can look at up Shino. “A new species, huh? Now I definitely feel special. Congrats on the success, though.”

Shino doesn’t answer, just raises one brow at him in a gesture that’s so familiar Kiba kind of wants to cry. He feels his smile falter, closes his eyes again. The darkness makes the truth come easier, somehow.

“I’m tired,” he admits, and his voice cracks. “I’m just—really fucking tired, Shino.”

There’s a moment of silence, and then Shino shifts, sitting on the ground next to him. Not quite touching, but—close.  _Warm_.

“We can stay here for a few more hours,” Shino says, tone as blunt as ever, but Kiba can feel the gaze on him, and it’s not even close to hostile. “But then we need to go home.”

“Home,” Kiba repeats, and it aches somewhere deep in his chest. Not in a bad way, though; more like a muscle relearning what was once a familiar motion. “Yeah, that—home sounds good.”

Shino doesn’t say anything, but he doesn’t move, and Kiba turns his head, presses his temple against the muscle of Shino’s thigh, and lets himself breathe in the scent of warm leaves and family.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> If you're looking for me on Tumblr, I'm @blackkatmagick.


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